Cisco to invest $1bn in world's largest cloud network

Networking specialist Cisco has unveiled plans to invest $1 billion into the creation of what it claims will be the world's largest 'global intercloud' - a connected system of cloud networks - to meet the future demands of the digital-driven environment.

It will be architected for the Internet of Everything, which is set to be one of the biggest trends of the coming years and will offer businesses a huge range of new sources of data that will need to be stored, managed and analysed.

Cisco stated its new global intercloud will feature a distributed network and security architecture designed for high-value application workloads, real-time analytics, 'near infinite' scalability and full compliance with local data sovereignty laws.

Robert Lloyd, president of development and sales at Cisco, said the "time is right" for the firm and its partners to invest in ground-breaking, application-centric solutions that will improve the reach of such services and offer firms a faster time to market.

He added: "Together, we have the capability to enable a seamless world of many clouds in which our customers have the choice to enable the right, highly secure cloud for the right workload, while creating strategic advantages for rapid innovation, and ultimately, business growth."

Cisco estimates that the Internet of Everything - the networked connection of people, processes, data and things - is set to represent an economic opportunity worth $19 trillion over the next decade.

However, it is likely to pose a number of challenges to businesses, which may need to overhaul their solutions in order to cope with the increasing amount of information available to them. Tools such as databases will need to be highly flexible and scalable to meet these demands, which expectations for security are also higher than ever.

Chris Gabriel, chief technology officer at Cisco partner Logicalis Group, said that as more businesses look to migrate operations to the cloud, "they are demanding reliable, highly secure, open and flexible cloud platforms, layered with services and applications on top that transform their access to and use of a growing range of business transformation applications", which the new project aims to help secure for companies.